The title of my blog describes me to a tee, I recently got back into my love for reading and wanted to share my thoughts. I started enjoying a glass of wine to help me relax and find time for myself by reading a good book.

The reclusive Ian barely participates in life, only doing so when his powers demand that he use them or pay the consequences. It seems that there’s not a single person on this planet who doesn’t want something from him, but the pain and suffering of others is nearly unbearable at times, leaving him no choice but to act.

That is until Wink unwittingly walks into his life, completely unaware that she’s stepped straight into the dragon’s den.

Wink is just trying to get home after a long day of work. Her plans for the evening do not include stumbling upon a man with blood on his hands hovering over a dead woman in her hallway.

There are three things that someone in Wink’s position should’ve done in that instance.

1. Slowly back away from the hot, bearded killer and run the other way.

2. Call the cops.

3. Not come back until the scene was safe.

Instead, she stops, takes a picture—drawing the man’s attention to her—and then takes off at the speed of a fat, blind and possibly intoxicated penguin.

Ian tries to let her go, but the moment that she runs, every single one of his predatory instincts surge to the surface and the hunt is on. Ian always catches his prey, this time is no different. What is different is that, for the first time in his life, he is consumed with the need to keep his catch.

She sniffled, and I looked up sharply.

And to my horror, I saw the first tear slip down one cheek.

Another tear soon followed.

“You’re crying?” I asked in outrage.

I didn’t handle tears well.

There was something about them that had the power to undo me.

“You can ignore me,” she said. “It’s just hormones.”

“Hormones?” I asked.

“You know…hormones. It’s that time of the month. It just happens,” she said flippantly.

“So there’s no reason for the tears…you’re just doing it,” I observed.

She nodded.

“It happens. A lot. Sometimes I cry because I need to, like after I’ve seen a sad video on YouTube. Or sometimes I hear a song that I really like, and the beauty of it moves me to tears,” she explained.

“So you’re crying now, not because anything’s amiss, but because you’re a girl,” I said. “Do I have that correct?”

She shrugged, causing me to sigh.

“That means nothing to me. If you’re going to speak girl, you’re going to have to give me a cheat guide or something. I never had a single female in my life, besides my sister, and that was a very long time ago,” I told her.

She glared at me, the tears gone.

“You’re not very nice,” she observed.

I knew that.

I couldn’t help it, either.

“I was raised in an orphanage,” I said. “I have absolutely no tact. If you want hearts and flowers, you’re going to have trouble getting that from me.”

“Who says that I want that from you?” she challenged. “I’ve only known you for a very short period of time. Not even long enough to form a valid opinion of you or your character.”

I sighed.

“Did you look in a mirror yet?” I asked her.

She stiffened and squirmed.

“No,” she lied.

My brows rose.

“You didn’t?” I asked. “Not even a little bit?”

She was cute when she lied.

Her nose had a small upturn to it, meaning I knew exactly when she started to lie because a little crease would appear on the bridge of her nose as she concentrated on what to say.

“Fine,” she snarled. “What’d you do to me?”

I laughed.

“I have no fucking clue,” I said honestly. “Magic, I guess.”

She pursed her lips in disgust.

“Seriously?” she asked. “That’s all you’ve got? Magic?”

I shrugged.

“I don’t know what else to call it,” I told her.

“Prove it,” she challenged.

I’m a married mother of three. My kids are all under 5, so I can assure you that they are a handful. I’ve been with my paramedic husband now for ten years, and we’ve produced three offspring that are nothing like us. I live in the greatest state in the world, Texas.

HOSTED BY:

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Title - Chasing Treasure: A Granite Lake Romance

Author: Jody A. Kessler

Genre: Contemporary Romance

ON SALE FOR $0.99 APRIL 6-12

After spending the winter apart, Treasure can’t stop thinking about her former paramedic partner, Bodie Everett. But, with her unfortunate history of dating, and an overwhelming fear of commitment, Treasure doesn’t know how she’ll react when Bodie returns from training at Wilderness School. Or, if the irresistible and sexy, Bodie, wants to continue where they left off back in December. With a flooded apartment and a ridiculous suspension from her job as a paramedic, Treasure heads to Granite Lake and back to her childhood home—a rundown apartment and a garage packed full of motorcycles.

Now that Bodie has new Search and Rescue certifications under his belt, he’s ready to move forward with his life. He hopes that includes a relationship with Treasure. After an unforgettable night together, he can’t seem to shake her from his head or his heart. He’s ready to take their friendship to the next level, but his intruding family members have their own agenda. Opening a brewpub with his brothers, joining the Mountain Division of Search and Rescue, and the surprise return of his ex-fiancé complicate and distract Bodie from chasing and catching Treasure.

Treasure rolled over and admired, not for the first time, Court’s hard, delicious deltoid muscles. They capped broad shoulders and flowed seamlessly down to meet bulging biceps. His muscles elicited a baser need to climb on top of him, squeeze him between her thighs and stroke every inch of his incredible arms—and the rest of him too. His triceps were ripped. His forearms could have belonged to Popeye. She glanced at his chest and almost drooled at the sight of the smooth bronze pecs and rippling abs.

Court caught her attention the moment he entered the bar last night. She’d been chatting with friends and he quickly became the game of the evening. She supposed she’d won. In all honesty, her girlfriends hadn’t been as driven to win the prize as strongly as she had. Treasure knew going to Paradiso would more than likely provide a new boy-toy, or two, and she thought she was in the mood to fool around with someone new.

She hadn’t exactly meant to end up in bed with him, but she hadn’t been opposed to it either. Now, she was in Court’s brand new condo wondering where her clothes were while trying not to berate herself for sleeping with someone she just met. What did she even know about this guy? He told her he was new in town, which explained why she and her friends had never seen him before. He said he moved to Reno for a job and his last name was Prescott. Court Prescott. That should have been a huge flag to their sexual incompatibility. His name sounded ridiculously pretentious to Treasure even though he didn’t come across that way. And who names their kid Court anyway? It reminded her of basketball or tennis. Which brought on the image of balls and that made her snicker as she mentally renamed him Court Tennis Balls Prescott. Yeah, balls had definitely been involved last night, she thought, and knew it was juvenile, but ball jokes never got old. Except for actual old balls and that was unpleasant to think about.

Lying next to him, Treasure slid Court the side eye. This wasn’t the first time she’d done something like this, but it was the first time she regretted it with such whole-hearted distaste. He’d been a sloppy and unrefined lover. The thought of kissing him made her queasy. His lips were beautiful but had no finesse. She should have known after the first kiss sex with this man would be disappointing, but she’d pursued him and kept the foreplay going with the hope that the night would get better with a little coaching. It hadn’t. She cringed remembering the lackluster roll in the sack and his less than stellar performance. For all his good looks, the man had no moves. Was it the tequila shots? Some men couldn’t handle their liquor and their women in the same night. In her own experience, she thought alcohol improved her sex drive, lowered her inhibitions, and generally made naked encounters with men much more exciting. She’d have to rethink this approach. Either way, in her current state of undress, the insufficient stimulation after they left Paradiso clung to her like slime-coated cellophane.

She inched across the mattress and paused, listening for a change in Court’s breathing. If she could sneak away without waking him, it would save her a headache. She never wanted to see him again. Uggg, she groaned to herself when he rolled over and his hand brushed her side.

His eyelids fluttered before opening. The whites of his eyes were bloodshot. Treasure swallowed and wished she had pretended to be asleep. A sly grin crept across his face. His body had originally attracted her, but those damned dimples sealed the deal.

The dimples reminded her of Bodie and sent her mind reeling with vivid memories of her friend and work partner. When you watched Bodie smile, you had to search for the dimples, like they were a secret hiding just below the surface. Bodie’s dimples weren’t as deep as Court’s, but Bodie’s were sexier. She wished she could see them now, damn it. Why was Bodie always on her mind?

“Hi to you too,” Bodie said on the other end of the line. “Where are you?”

“Granite Lake. I, umm,” Shivers crept over her skin after mentioning Granite Lake with Bodie’s voice in her ear. She wanted a replay of their night together. She needed him triply bad after her experience with Court.

“Hmm….” he hummed into the phone.

She didn’t know if any sexual innuendo existed in the smooth purr coming out of him, or if it was the sound of curiosity being answered, but her inner thighs shivered. The phone beeped its low battery warning. Tamping down her lust, she said, “It’s not as great as it sounds. I have a mess to clean up at my dad’s old place. And I have a disaster at work to handle when I return to civilization. Cheer me up before my phone dies.”

“No charger?”

“Uh-uh. I rushed to get to the mountains and accidentally left it behind.”

“What’s going on at the ambulance barn?”

“I don’t want to get into it.”

“That bad?” he asked.

“Sort of.” And worse, she thought to herself. “Working with you was a thousand times better.”

“About that…” he said.

Treasure filled the gap. “You’re a total punk. A paramedic demigod compared to what I’ve been dealing with.” She didn’t want to rehash her time spent with Court. Luckily Bodie shifted gears.

“I can be nice. When I want to.” Treasure walked into the apartment and curled up on the couch.

“You may not be so kind when I tell you my news.”

“I’m not sure I can handle any more bad news today. Can’t you just tell me your naughtiest fantasy before my phone dies? I need something tantalizing to get me through the night.”

“You’re so not ready for one of my fantasies.”

“Now you have to tell me. I promise I can handle it.”

“I don’t think so. Besides, I didn’t agree you won,” he said.

“I did. But since you object, I’ll tell you a secret.”

She almost said, ‘I can’t wait to see you again. You’ve totally ruined my chances at ever having a worthwhile orgasm and you need to help me out immediately.’ Instead, she bit her lip. They weren’t a couple and she didn’t know what he thought about jumping into a relationship. “I miss you, Bodie. Work was pure hell this week.”

He stayed silent for a beat too long. Treasure regretted her confession. Speaking her emotions was difficult. She’d rather have a root canal in most cases. The secret she shared wouldn’t be hard for any normal person to say aloud, but it felt a little too real for Treasure. In the next moment, she erased her regret. She wanted to be truer to herself where Bodie was concerned.

Treasure’s dour outlook perked up a bit. She liked when he said “fantasize,” and “hot.”

“You and me,” he continued. “I want to take the boat out on the lake. You up for it?”

“Definitely,” she said.

“Good.”

He didn’t continue like she hoped.

“That’s it? That’s your fantasy?”

“No. Of course there’s more. It has to be hot enough to swim. We’ll bring beer. Good beer. IPA beer. And chips and donuts. Why you like those awful mini powdered donuts is beyond me.”

She smiled into the phone. “And mini cherry pie.”

“Yeah, those too. And I can’t wait to put my hands on you…” he paused for affect.

Treasure held her breath imagining his hands on her body.

“And push your ass into the water.”

“Nice. Real nice,” she said sarcastically. “Your fantasy is lacking…umm,” she paused, searching for the right words. “Zing. Zest. Color. Sexiness. Give me something to warm me up and keep me company while I sleep.”

“What are you talking about? My fantasy is perfect.” He sounded offended. “I’ll let you wrap your hands around my…fishing pole if you want.”

“Fishing pole better be code for something else, Bodie Everett,” she warned, and laughed when she heard him snickering.

Jody A. Kessler is the winner of the Readers’ Crown Award for Best Paranormal Romance and an international bestselling author. She writes contemporary romance, historical time travel fiction, and paranormal fiction. She is the author of the An Angel Falls series, Granite Lake Romance series, The Night Medicine and more.

Jody invites you to stop by her website and see what’s new at: www.JodyAKessler.com. Subscribe to the newsletter and receive a FREE eBook.

Kicked out at fifteen for being gay, Tom survived by selling his body on the streets. Four years later, Tom, now nineteen, doesn’t know how long he can continue living this life.

One night while out working, Tom sees a face from his past, one he had long forgotten. One he had used to fantasise about.

Sebastian Banks

Afraid of the reaction he will receive, Tom runs away hoping never to see him again. But Seb had other ideas.

Seb Banks

At twenty-five, Seb’s life is going exactly the way he had wanted. Having worked hard at University, Seb has been offered a permanent contract at a local solicitor.

While driving to a friend’s house to celebrate, Seb is shocked to find Tom, someone he hasn’t seen in years, on the streets, selling himself.

Feeling an overwhelming need to help Tom, Seb tracks him down and offers him a way out.

Is Tom willing to take a chance on Seb and accept his offer, or will his distrust of everyone from his past cause him to push Seb away?

Seb pushed away from the counter and turned, bumping into Tom, not realising he had followed him. He stared into Tom's blue eyes and watched as the pupils dilated. Tom licked his lips, and Seb copied the action. His nostrils flared as he caught Tom's scent and he hardened in his jeans. He hadn't been this close to him other than when he'd been fixing his cut eye, and he suddenly had the overwhelming urge to kiss him. Seb looked down at Tom's lips and watched as they parted.

He reached a hand up and gently touched Tom's cheek, feeling the stubble on his jaw. Leaning forward, he paused, waiting for Tom to push him away or to speak and when he didn't, he touched his lips to Tom's and felt him inhale sharply. Nothing happened for a second, and then Tom hesitantly kissed him back, just a meeting of lips, a series of small kisses before they both pulled away, looking at each other.

He stepped back and looked at Tom, noting the stunned expression on his face, and he quickly apologised. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that." He cleared his throat. "I'll put some clean clothes in the bedroom for you to use. See you in the morning."

He rushed upstairs to his room and shut the door, leaning back and banging his head against it. God, what a fucking idiot. Why the fuck had he done that? Now he's going to think the only reason I let him stay is for sex. Groaning, he threw himself on his bed and glared at the ceiling.

Megs Pritchard lives in England and is a mother to two small boys. When she isn’t working or being mummy, she is busy writing about complex characters that know the harsh realities of life but want a HEA.

A lover of M/M and M/F romances she believes everyone deserves to be happy, healthy and loved.

Growing up in a military family, Megs has traveled Europe and has a great deal of respect and gratitude for all the men and women who have and who still serve. Her dream job was to be a Bomb Disposal Expert and even had her own ‘kit’ when she was younger.

She is currently working on her first full length series called Second Chances.

Sally was your normal everyday North Devon Policewoman. Settled and content
in her self-made life after her ordeal. Jacob lived a sheltered, devout
life, one that had him at a significant disadvantage. Brought together by
tragedy & abuse, the ultimate reward for their battery was the one
thing they had both been denied: True Love With determination, patience and
respect, Sally leads Jacob from solitude and brings him into the light of
the world he was denied. But when all is well, life has been transformed,
and the healing has begun, will Sally’s secret undo it all?

EXCERPT

Jacob awoke, slowly, hearing what sounded like an angel, but this wasn't
right, he deserved to burn in hell. His father told him this so often that
it must be true, but a demon wouldn't have a warm, soft voice, full of
concern and sympathy.

"Jacob? Jacob? Can you hear me? What happened to you? Please wake up, I
can't get a signal down here and I don't want to leave you."

Sally was kneeling beside him, her face lined with concern and worry. Jacob
opened his eyes, and the angel's face swim into focus. She was as beautiful
as he remembered.

"What? How did you get in?" His mind racing, panic surging through him, his
back burning and tight from the kiss of the leather strap. Resisting the
urge to stroke his face, though wanting to very much, knowing this would
not have the calming effect she wanted, Sally answered, her voice soft, as
if talking to a wounded animal.

"I called out, when you didn't answer I went around to the kitchen. The
door was unlocked, I was worried about you. When I found you down here, I
thought you were dead. What happened to you? Who did this to you?" Sally's
mind was racing. Had he been attacked? Unlikely, no one knew he was here,
unless it was a random criminal stumbling across the house. That was even
more unlikely, so what the hell happened here? Jacob was covered in blood,
even more pale than before. But his was a mystery that would have to wait,
she needed to get Jacob upstairs and see what injuries he had.

"Can you stand? I need to get you off this cold floor." She held out her
hand, and he slowly placed

his in hers. She felt the rough callouses borne of a life of hard labour,
but his grip was firm and she helped to haul him to his feet. As he stood,
his head started spinning and he stumbled forward, right into Sally's arms,
and he felt, briefly, her warm soft body against his, and he liked the
sensation. Then the thought of what he had already had to do hit him and he
pushed her away.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lainy has had a varied career, having many different jobs from working as a
health care assistant, to serving five years in the RAF, to stitching
underwear for a large department store chain. She is currently doing hard
labour in retail. She had a love of black cats, cruising and coffee. She
lives in Cambridgeshire and when not writing or wearing a plastic grin at
work, can be seen out and about with her trusty old Nikon, indulging in her
hobby of photography.

I am the world’s biggest dating failure. We’re talking my last date went home with our waitress kind of failure.

But I have an ace in the back pocket of my mom jeans—my sexy-as-sin best friend, NHL superstar forward, Justin Cruise.

Justin owes me favors dating back to seventh grade, long before he became a hotshot with a world famous…stick. So in return for my undying platonic loyalty, all I want is an easy-peasy crash course on how to be a sex goddess.

How hard can it be?

***

I have never been so hard in my life.

The things I want to do to my sweet, kindergarten-teaching, mitten-crocheting best friend Libby Collins are ten different kinds of wrong. Maybe twenty.

But I’m a firm believer in teaching by example, and by the end of our first lesson, we’ve graduated to a hands on approach to her sexual education: my hands all over her, her hands all over me, and her hot mouth melting beneath mine as I prove to her there isn’t a damned thing wrong with the way she kisses.

Give me a month, and I’ll transform Libby from wall flower to wall banger, and ensure she’s confident enough to seduce any guy she wants.

U.S.A. Today Bestselling author Lili Valente has slept under the stars in Greece, eaten dinner at midnight with French men who couldn’t be trusted to keep their mouths on their food, and walked alone through Munich’s red light district after dark and lived to tell the tale.

These days you can find her writing in a tent beside the sea, drinking coconut water and thinking delightfully dirty thoughts.

He was hot. I was naked. And we had no chance in hell at ever being platonic.

I’ll be the first to admit that I live at extremes. After going ten years locked in what felt like a dysfunctional marriage, I’m now decidedly boy-free. In nearly three years I’ve had no boyfriends, no flings, no dates and no sex. For the sake of my dream career, the sacrifice has been easy.

At least it was.

Until Lukas came along.

He’s rude, gorgeous, arrogant – a stone-carved wall of muscle and distraction. He’s everything I know to avoid but there’s no avoiding your next-door neighbor. Oh yeah. The man now lives three steps from me and to make matters worse, he crashed into my life while I was soaked in the tub. Mortifying to say the least and it went something like this: I ran out exposed. He looked. He laughed.

And then I locked myself out.

In short, Lukas Hendricks was smirking, swaggering trouble from the start. And me?

Stella Rhys is an author of contemporary romance and can't help but write it hot, steamy and borderline filthy (just kidding, it's flat-out filthy). Writing aside, she lives for coffee, the Yankees and cooking recipes way out of her league. She was born and raised in New York and now lives there with her husband and charmingly entitled fur baby.

A FULL-LENGTH STANDALONE, a great entry into the world of international
bestseller Rachael Herron's sexy and hilarious books.

When their world-famous
band The Darling Songbirds split up acrimoniously, sisters Adele, Molly and
Lana went their separate ways. A decade on, Adele and Molly have finally
reconciled. However Lana has remained stubbornly estranged – until now.

Lana Darling’s bank
account is finally filled to the top, thanks to the song she sold to another
singer, but she’s never made it as a solo artist. Is it finally time to give it
all up?

But when she heads home
to Darling Bay, she has country music super-mega-star Taft Hill hot on her
heels. The sexy star isn’t prepared to let her call it quits – especially when
he desperately needs new songs for his album.

Lana and Taft have a
history – and both have secrets to hide. But when events take an unexpected
turn, will Lana choose her career or Taft? Or will she chose the long-awaited
chance to get back in harmony with her songbird sisters?

Rachael Herron is the bestselling author of the novels The Ones Who Matter Most (named a 2016 Editor's Pick by Library Journal), Splinters of Light and Pack Up the Moon (all from Penguin), the Darling Bay and the Cypress Hollow series, and the memoir, A Life in Stitches (Chronicle). She received her MFA in writing from Mills College, Oakland and she teaches writing in the extension programs at both UC Berkeley and Stanford. She’s proud to be a New Zealander as well as a US citizen, though her Kiwi accent only comes out when she’s very tired.

If I win, and I always win, I get an animalistic rush that can only be
satiated by a woman’s body. And there she is, waiting to interview me.

Erica

I wasn’t attending the NFL game to see Kyle Murphy, like everyone else. I
was there because I had a job to do. I had an interview to take, and I was
willing to do anything to get it.

Chiseled body, six-pack abs, permanent obnoxious smile. He decided to
undress in front of me, in the locker room. And then he invited me to watch
him take a shower.

And I was floored. All self-control was out of the window. He was going to
have me, and I was willing to abandon all professional ethics for the sake
of the interview I wanted.

But then everyone found out. And I was left with a secret that not even he
can find out.

Kyle

I get an adrenaline rush after I win a game. An instant, animalistic
instinct that can only be satiated by a woman’s body.

So I was lucky that Erica Lee, a fresh-faced young reporter was waiting for
me after the game.

But unlike all my other fans, she was a tough nut to crack.

When I succeeded, it was like nothing else. I had to have her again. I
wanted more.

So when my manager said I needed a pretend girlfriend to clear my name, I
knew exactly whom I wanted...

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ava Walsh has a weak spot for bad boys, the irresistible ones that make
your cheeks flush and annoy the hell out of you, making you want them even
more. And of course for the women that succeed in winning their hearts.

Ava writes sexy, passionate and sweet stories that are short enough to
brighten up your evening, and that always have a happily ever after.

She lives in warm California with her family. When she’s not writing, she’s
usually found in the kitchen trying out a new recipe. Favorite things
include reading, her horses and everything involving chocolate.

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